homestuckroleplayfandomcom-20200214-history
Mythological roles
Aspects are a form of generalized "elements", in that they are primal forces of reality. Classes describe mechanics and intended roles, "channeling" the aspect into possible action and powers. Classes come in active (-) and passive (+) pairs, which can mean multiple things but roughly described as the active classes employing or affecting their aspect directly and for their own gain, and the passive classes being affected by their aspect, and sharing their actions with the team. In short, aspects describe a type of power that a player would have and classes describe how the power manifests itself. Do note though that literal interpretation of the aspects' and classes' names can be misleading, e.g. "Prince" actually means "destroyer", and "Light" means "fortune". Players with different aspects can end up with very similar powers depending on their class. The Life and Doom aspects may be radically different, but depending on the class their powers may end up being similar. Players may also develop abilities contrary to their role if they are "heavily resistant to their trUe calling. or, if corrUpted in some way by an oUtside inflUence." Rose Lalonde is the most prominent and extreme example of this. Other examples can be constructed, but remain speculative due to exposition on the class and aspect system being sporadic. The terms "Hero" or "Player" can be used in lieu of the class when the speaker wishes to be generic, e.g.: John and Tavros are "Heroes of Breath" and Roxy is "a Void player." Both components of the title appear to have some mechanical effect on the game, depending on the class or element assigned. The salamanders of the Land of Crypts and Helium and the B2 Carapacians use the term "Noble" to refer to their Heroes, possibly implying that Nobles suffer and become martyrs rather than saving others as a Hero might. Sburb may design planets with the titles in mind. For the kids one part seems to come from their aspect, while the other comes from their associated element, or a force actively opposing it (dark clouds in John's case and frost in Jade's). The trolls' planets mostly relate to their interests, but some show a clear connection to their titles. Doc Scratch implies that every successful session will have a Hero of Time, so as to provide access to a scratch construct should the players irreparably fail. Because their amphibian ectobreeding duties are necessary for victory, Heroes of Space are also a constant in a successful game. Calliope has confirmed that these two aspects are indeed the minimum requirement for a session to not inherently be a Null session or worse. The only exception seen is potentially with the post-scratch kids, who, though they lack both Time and Space players and as a result lack a frog planet or scratch construct, through cosmic consequence their session anticipates the arrival of their pre-scratch players, with all their planets in tow, creating an effective 8 player session that does include a Space and Time player. There are at least two rare classes referred to as "master classes". One, the Muse, is "the most passive class" and strictly for females. Its counterpart, Lord, is the male master class and the most active class. It is entirely possible that the number of players in a given session will determine what titles the game can and will assign. It appears games with four or more eliminates the chance to receive master classes, which may serve the purpose of fulfilling multiple roles in under-populated games.